


Same Time?

by FlitShadowflame



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: M/M, old guys getting married, old guys having sex, old guys with dogs, that's it that's the whole fic right there
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-16
Updated: 2017-03-16
Packaged: 2018-10-05 22:33:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10318589
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FlitShadowflame/pseuds/FlitShadowflame
Summary: Dog park meet cute Adoribull.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Elpie (Horribibble)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Horribibble/gifts).



> Special thanks to Elpie for the idea.

“Duchess, _no_!” Dorian shouts, chasing after his dog. He’d been seconds from getting her leash on, honestly -

She trots back to him with someone else’s tennis ball in her mouth. Dorian sighed. Another dog barks loudly, chasing Duchess.

Another very tiny, very fluffy dog. Dorian’s mustache twitches. “Did you steal his toy, Duchess?” he asks, arching a brow. Duchess tries to bark, but the tennis ball muffles the sound.

A great big Qunari completes the farce by huffing and puffing as he follows both dogs to Dorian. “C’mon, Boris, you know I can’t think when you shout,” he says amiably.

“Boris” stops barking, but starts growling most un-ferociously instead.

“Sorry about him,” the Qunari tells Dorian.

“No, I think it’s Duchess’ fault entirely. Duchess, drop it,” he says sharply. She obeys with a whine and Boris immediately snatches the ball back, tail wagging.

“I’m the Iron Bull,” the Qunari says, offering a hand now that he’s caught his breath. “And the menace is Boris.”

“Dorian Pavus,” Dorian smiles. “And really, Duchess knows better than to steal toys.”

Duchess leans against his leg, panting.

“Boris could learn to share,” Bull says, grinning. “I brought extra tennis balls.”

“I may take you up on that. We left her favorite toy at home.”

“This is an off-leash park, you know. You won’t need that,” Bull says when Dorian moves to leash Duchess.

“I suppose you’ve never been glared at by a soccer mom for having a ‘dangerous animal’ on the loose,” Dorian drawls, but he leaves the leash off.

“Dangerous? Not this lovely lady,” Bull says, stroking her neck. Big as the Qunari is, Duchess still comes up to his gut.

“No, she’s harmless. Puts on a good show sometimes, but I’ve only seen her actually bite once, and that was when my ex-boyfriend tried to hit me. He wasn’t reckoning on Duchess getting involved.”

“I hope he didn’t try anything else,” Bull says with a frown.

“On the contrary, he gave me a very wide berth while he collected his things and left.”

“Boris actually belonged to a previous partner of mine, but they moved to a place where they couldn’t have pets, after we broke up,” Bull says. “I probably would’ve named him Tank or something - he thinks he’s a big dog, it’s adorable.”

Bull throws a tennis ball and both dogs go haring after it.

“Duchess is a rescue,” Dorian sighs. “I was only going to foster her, but she and I got attached very quickly. I couldn’t bear to let her go. That was almost six years ago.”

“I can’t imagine life without Boris now,” Bull admits, smiling again.

They spend a perfectly pleasant afternoon chatting and playing fetch, but Dorian doesn’t think much of it until Bull asks, “Same time next week?”

For some reason, Dorian says, “We’ll be here.”

+

It’s the third weekend of playtime with Bull and Boris before Bull sucks up his nerves and asks, “Would you like to go to dinner with me?” while clearly bracing himself for rejection.

Dorian just smiles shyly. In three weeks, they haven’t run out of things to talk about. “I’d like that,” he says, because he’d been wondering how to ask the same question.

Dinner is different. They meet each other’s eyes more, for one. They’re not interrupted by barking or slobbery tennis balls, either.

It goes well. It goes so well that Dorian almost regrets that it has to end, and then Bull suggests dessert.

They don’t end up having dessert; they go to Dorian’s place for “coffee,” which quickly turns into lingering kisses and heated looks. Dorian doesn’t mind.

“I liked this,” Bull says, nuzzling Dorian’s neck. “We need to do it again.”

“We can arrange that. Same time next week?”

“I’ll be there.”

In a novel turn of events, it’s four dates before they fall into bed. Dorian has never in his life waited so long, but he doesn’t want to lose Bull by pushing.

The reason for the wait becomes clear soon enough. Bull is ashamed, Dorian realizes, of his difficult joints and surgical scars. So they don’t undress much the first time. The second time, Dorian kisses every scar as its uncovered, and Bull recites its origin. He seems least affected by the memories of Seheron, which must be more than a decade old, even though those are the most gruesome scars.

He positively lights up when he tells the story of his eye, a bar fight that won him a best friend for life.

The newer scars trouble him more. His leg and chest are marked from a bypass surgery that saved his life. His knee is mostly artificial. His massive hands are mangled from the workplace accident that left him permanently disabled.

Dorian reveals his own insecurities: his silvering hair, the old scars from his years as a duelist, his fading eyesight, and Bull settles down some.

“Even your scars are pretty,” Bull remarks, kissing one that wraps around Dorian’s wrist like a silver bracelet. “That takes some skill.”

“They’re a part of me now. The mind can adapt to anything, given enough time.”

“Can I be a part of you?” Bull asks suggestively. Dorian laughs and straddles the Qunari’s chest.

“Why don’t we wrestle for it?” he challenges.

Gently, with more kisses than submission holds, they grapple for control. Dorian giggles a little because of just how unlike this is to the power struggles of his youth.

“I am victorious,” Bull crows, pinning Dorian to the bed and kissing him sweetly. “Are you my prize?”

“I suppose so,” Dorian shrugs, and is soundly kissed again.

“Good.” Bull cups Dorian’s arse in one giant hand and Dorian revels in the unusual sensation of smallness. “You want me to fuck you, Dorian?” Bull asks.

“Yes,” Dorian admits without shame. He’s had a lifetime to grow comfortable with his proclivities, and so he has grown comfortable. Not proud, but content. Bull breathes in deeply, scenting Dorian.

“Where’s your slick?” he asks, letting Dorian up so the mage can rummage in the bedside table. A tube of gel is produced, and the Iron Bull puts his fingers to work.

“You can be rougher than that,” Dorian grunts, and Bull obliges him, speeds up his preparations.

They fuck, but it’s the half-hour afterward that feels more intimate to Dorian. Bull cleans him up and then, rather than leaving, he climbs back into bed and holds Dorian close.

They talk like that, wrapped up in each other’s arms, and Dorian realizes he’s never felt so connected to anyone in his life.

“Same time next week?” he half-jokes, a little afraid this will be the end - so many times, just as he’d felt a relationship was going somewhere, the other man would end things.

“Next week? How about, same time tomorrow?” Bull asks, hiding his own fears. Now that Dorian has seen all of him, what more could he possibly want from a broken down Qunari?

“Tomorrow sounds good to me,” Dorian says, smiling. “You can bring Boris, if you like.”

+

They spend the next few years in a kind of holding pattern: Saturdays at the dog park, Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays together at Dorian’s house. Sometimes they go to Bull’s place for variety, but Duchess doesn’t like the cozy little apartment. She needs space to run.

“So,” Bull says one day, as their afternoon at the dog park is coming to an end. He turns to face Dorian on the bench and presents a little box. “Same time forever?”

Dorian gives him a slightly watery smile. “We’ll be there.”


End file.
